11Apr2017

How to commission customised or bespoke furniture

Commission a piece of bespoke furniture and you’ll end up with exactly the furniture that you want. We can work with you to give the design you want to exactly fit the space you have in mind in exactly the colour you want and exactly the wood. You can choose the handles you want on the front of it and it will be unique to your home.

A bespoke walnut circular table. The design was commissioned by our client, who worked with our design office

What we can do

While our interior designer clients are used to commissioning furniture, we provide a quick how-to those less used to the process.

About 50 per cent of the furniture we make is custom-made. Some pieces involve small alterations to dimensions, with other pieces we will modify the design, often simplifying it. We also design many tables, chairs, benches, sideboards and beds from scratch. Sometimes a client will draw something they want and other times they’ve seen a photograph of a piece and want the same. Sometimes a client will just have a very vague idea of what they might want and we’ll take it from there, establishing a style that they like and helping them to get a piece of furniture that they didn’t know they wanted (and are usually delighted with).

Either way, it’s a pleasurable experience. We also love a challenge, so don’t be put off if you think something is too complicated. We’re also very happy to come and visit your home if you want us to design your furniture with a space in mind. We frequently design furniture to fit your floorplan

A beautiful bespoke oak bed which we designed for a client. Inspiration came from a mahogany bed, which was redesigned in oak.

A close-up of the acorn finial on the bed

How to commission a piece of furniture in 8 easy steps

We’d love you to pick up the phone (01473 252158) and have a quick chat or email to discuss what you want. We should be able to advise whether it’s going to be possible (there are very few pieces that we have to say no to) and we’re very approachable.

We’ll then liaise with our design office and workshops to get a ballpark price, which we’ll base on an existing piece of furniture that has a similar amount of work involved.

If you want to take it further, we’ll go ahead and our design team will draw something up. This is still done the old-fashioned way (by pencil). Sometimes we’ll produce exactly what our clients want first time, other times we’ll produce a drawing and have to alter it the old-fashioned way (by using a rubber) and go back and forth until we’re all happy with it.

Our workshops will then be able to give us an accurate price and we can take it from there.

When you order you’ll sign off a drawing, choose your colour and finish. We can send out samples for you to match to your furniture at home.

If you want us to email you updates and pictures of your piece being made, we’re very happy to do that.

We’ll get in touch when it’s ready to arrange delivery.

If you’d like to keep the drawing of the piece, again we’re very happy for you to have a copy.

An oak console table which was commissioned by an interior designer

The bulk of the cost of our furniture is in the number of hours it takes to make, so if a piece has been painstakingly hand-carved, then it’s going to be more expensive. But we are really flexible. If you have a budget in mind, we can quickly let you know whether we’ll be able to give you the piece of furniture you want.

A case study

We worked with a client on this piece. Although he liked our standard carved table, he wasn’t that keen on the price, so we removed the carving from the apron (the rail underneath the table top), making it in a slightly smaller size, and simplified a couple of other details which brought the price down from £7,425 to around £3,250

The full Elizabethan! This is the original table that the table above is based on

If you want a tour of our workshops at any time to meet our talented team or to pick finishes, it’s a reassuringly friendly process. Call us on 01473 252158, we’re here Monday – Friday 9am-5pm and are very happy to come in on a Saturday to show you around.